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Coal Mine Safety Regulation in China and the USA

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Coal Mine Safety Regulation in China and the USA Journal of Contemporary Asia Vol. 39, No. 3, August 2009, pp. 424–439 Coal Mine Safety Regulation in China and the USA ANDREW W. HOMER Tulane University Law School, New Orleans, LA, USA ABSTRACT The People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the USA are, by long measure, the world’s largest producers and consumers of coal. Coal production is inherently risky, and fatal- ities are unavoidable in these large coal economies. Both countries have developed complex sys- tems of law to regulate coal mine safety. These systems share many attributes. Despite similarities between the separate systems of mining law, the PRC significantly trails the USA in terms of coal mine safety. Due to large disparity in economic development, it may be inap- propriate to compare these two countries. However, the PRC’s mine safety record is significantly worse than that of other large producers who are similarly underdeveloped. It appears that the PRC has failed to effectively implement its mining safety laws. Several arguments have been made as to the cause of this failure, including lack of judicial review of agency actions, lack of meaningful trade unions, government corruption and geographical difficulties of controlling rural mines with a central government. This article explores similarities and differences between the coal economies of the USA and PRC, and introduces some of the arguments used to explain the gap in safety. KEY WORDS: Coal, safety, labour, mining, mine, mine safety, China The People’s Republic of China (PRC) is the world’s largest producer by a significant margin. In 2006, it produced an estimated 2482 Mt (million tons) of coal. The second largest producer, the USA, produced 990 Mt in 2006. The PRC’s 2006 production dwarfed the rest of the world’s, with a total larger than the combined tally of the next seven largest producers, including the USA. The 990 Mt produced in the USA also accounted for a huge portion of the world total, and was larger than the combined total from the number three, four and five producers (World Coal Institute, 2007: 1). The World Coal Institute’s estimated production numbers for the ten largest coal producing nations in 2006 are referenced in Table 1. The production numbers in the PRC and the USA are fostered by huge domestic markets for coal, and neither produces a significant surplus for export. The PRC exported an estimated 63 Mt, or about 2.5% of its total production in 2006. If these exports are adjusted to account for the 38 Mt of coal the PRC imported, then Correspondence Address: Andrew W. Homer, Tulane University Law School, 6329 Freret St., New Orleans, LA 70118, USA. Email: [email protected] ISSN 0047-2336 Print/1752-7554 Online/09/030424-16 Ó 2009 Journal of Contemporary Asia DOI: 10.1080/00472330902944511 Coal Mine Safety Regulation in China and the USA 425 Table 1. Major coal producing countries Country Production (Mt) PR China 2482 USA 990 India 427 Australia 309 South Africa 244 Russia 233 Indonesia 169 Poland 95 Kazakhstan 92 Colombia 64 approximately 2455 Mt of coal were either consumed in the country or added to domestic recovered reserves in 2006. The USA exported only 45 Mt, or approximately 4.5% of the coal it produced in 2006, leaving 945 Mt for domestic consumption and recovered reserves (World Coal Institute, 2007: 1).1 Coal currently provides more than 70% of the PRC’s energy needs, and the economy and energy demand are growing rapidly. State-controlled media outlets reported that coal consumption in the country jumped 18% during the first six months of 2007, tracking slightly higher than the country’s explosive GDP growth (Schiller, 2007: 4). While the Chinese government has made massive investment in alternative sources of energy, such as hydropower, in recent years (Yardley, 2007), for the foreseeable future coal is king. In the USA, coal fuelled approximately 50% of electricity production in 2006 (World Coal Institute, 2007: 2) and that share will likely grow with energy demand as natural gas and viable, large-scale alternative energy sources remain expensive. Chinese and US Mine Safety Statistics Coal mining is a very risky business and devastating accidents occur in all countries that produce commercial quantities of the mineral. Most coal mine accidents occur as the result of cave-ins, methane explosions or the flooding of mine shafts (Tien, 2005). Given the huge production and consumption numbers in the PRC and the USA, and the inherent risk of working underground with combustible elements, significant numbers of mine accidents are to be expected in both countries. Similarly, comprehensive legislation and administrative agencies directly dealing with mine safety should be expected. Both the PRC and the USA have such regulatory regimes in place, as outlined below. Nevertheless, both countries experience significant numbers of mining fatalities each year. The PRC, however, is host to a disproportionate number of coal mining fatalities when examined as a function of production. Although China’s record on more traditional ‘‘human rights’’ is often the source of international headlines, some have termed the crisis in Chinese coal mine safety as the nation’s ‘‘lesser-known human rights tragedy’’ (Lambrecht, 2005b: 5). 426 A. W. Homer According to the PRC State Administration of Work Safety (SAWS), 5798 coal miners died in workplace accidents in China in 2000, 5670 were killed in coal mines in 2001, and deaths peaked in 2002, when a total of 6995 miners died (China Labour Bulletin, 2006b).2 A further 6434 Chinese mine workers perished in 2003, 6027 in 2004 and 5986 in 2005 (China Labour Bulletin, 2006b). Official statistics place the 2006 death toll at 4746 miners (Schiller, 2007) and at 1066 for the first half of 2007. If the death totals are considered as a function of production, the PRC lost 4.95 miners per Mt of coal produced in 2000, 4.38 miners per Mt in 2001, 5.27 miners per Mt in 2002, 4.28 miners per Mt in 2003, 3.08 miners per Mt in 2004, 2.69 miners per Mt in 2005 and 1.91 miners per Mt in 2006 (China Labour Bulletin, 2007b; World Coal Institute, 2007). Considered on their own, these figures give some reason for optimism. As a ratio to the amount of coal produced, Chinese coal mine fatalities were far lower in 2006 than they were in 2000. The decrease in deaths per Mt is even greater between the deadliest year, 2002, and 2006. Indeed, the fatality to production ratio through the first half of 2007 was down almost 20% from the same period in 2006, to 1.63 fatalities per Mt (China Labour Bulletin, 2007b). However, when the PRC statistics are compared to those of the second major coal economy, the USA, it is clear that Chinese coal mines are disproportionately deadly. For the entire period 2000–06, a total of 235 miners were killed in coal mine accidents in the USA (US Department of Labor, 2007c). In those years, the number of miners killed per Mt of coal peaked at 0.05 (2006) and was as low as 0.02 (2005) (US Department of Labor, 2007c; World Coal Institute, 2007). In 2000 and 2001, the fatality to production ratio was 0.04 workers per Mt (US Department of Labor, 2007c; World Coal Institute, 2007). The fatality to production ratio was 0.03 miners per Mt in 2002, 2003 and 2004 (US Department of Labor, 2007c; World Coal Institute, 2007). Is it Fair to Compare Chinese and US Mine Safety Statistics? In terms of economic development, there are huge differences between the PRC and the USA. According to statistics compiled by the World Bank, the USA ranked first for Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2006 at US$13.2 trillion.3 Although the PRC ranked fourth on the list, its GDP is listed at $2.7 trillion, just 20% of the US figure (World Bank, 2007c). On the other hand, the PRC had the largest population in the world in 2006 at 1.3 billion people, while the USA has the third largest at 299 million (World Bank, 2007b). That is, the 2006 US GDP was roughly 80% larger than China’s, while its population was some 77% smaller. This disparity is even more evident in terms of Gross National Income (GNI) per capita, where the USA ranked tenth at $44,970 and the PRC ranked 129th at $2,010 (World Bank, 2007a). Based on the World Bank’s classification of countries, the PRC is a ‘‘lower middle income’’ economy, while the USA is a ‘‘high income’’ economy (World Bank, 2007d). Accordingly, a head-to-head comparison on worker safety may be argued as inappropriate. Indeed, it may be more appropriate to compare the PRC to the USA at a much earlier stage in the latter’s economic development. For example, in 1907 the US mining industry experienced its deadliest year, with 3242 fatalities (US Department of Labor, 2007a). Although the US Department of Energy lists official Coal Mine Safety Regulation in China and the USA 427 production statistics only from 1949 onwards, a 1911 newspaper article lists 1907 US production at 480 Mt (New York Times, 3 January 1911). Using this value, the fatality to production ratio for the USA in 1907 was 6.75. Similar arguments have been put forward concerning more traditional notions of political, civil or human rights. In his study of the PRC’s performance with respect to democratisation and economic development, Randall Peerenboom (2007: 39) notes that ‘‘[p]erformance on human rights standards . and other indicia of human well- being, is highly correlated with wealth.’’ Essentially, Peerenboom (2007: 39) argues that the PRC is following a hybrid of the traditional ‘‘East Asian Model’’ of democratisation, which ‘‘emphasizes economic development as the motor for other reforms.’’ Such ‘‘other reforms’’ may be thought of as including those related to core worker safety and the number of work-related injuries and fatalities.
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